Alternate/Reworked Aging

[Ranged Ranger]

New* Aging System (*see Note here, also updated to have humans and other races togeather...)

This rework gives playable races 12 age categories and is based on gain and loss of traits rather than ability just ability score changes. It allows for a bit more customization and slightly more life-like aging affects... 12 categories seemed to make sense and created symmetry with true dragons as an unexpected bonus...

Adventuring age before becoming a ‘legal adult for most purposes’ should require DM approval. Adventuring as an Infant, Toddler, or Venerable character should not be allowed.

Infants and Toddlers are two size categories smaller; children are one or two sizes smaller depending on the individual; and pre-adolescents, adolescents, and pre-teens are one size category smaller than the older categories of their race.

Gnomes are more different from SRD than other races in anticipation of a race rework that I am planning.

High Magic

Infant	chose one A
Toddler	chose one A
Child	chose one A or B
Pre-Adolescent	chose one A or B
Adolescent	choose one B or C
Post Adolescent (Legally Adult for Most Purposes)	choose one B or C
Adult	Choose one C
Middle Age	choose one C and lose 1 A or Choose one D
Mature Adult	choose one C and lose 1 A or Choose one D
Senior	lose one A or B and gain a D; lose an extra A to gain a C
Elderly	lose one A or B and gain a D
Venerable	lose one A or B and gain a D

	Toddler	Child	Pre-Adolescent	Adolescent	Post Adolescent	Adult	Middle Age	Mature Adult	Senior	Elderly	Venerable	Max
Humans (High Magic)	2	4	7	10	13	16	40	58	70	76	90	70+3d10+1d20
Humans (Historical/Low Magic*)	2	4	7	10	13	16	22	36	41	46	52	52+3d12
Humans (Modern*)	2	4	8	14	17	26	40	58	70	76	90	70+3d10+1d20
Elves	4	9	16	20	25	40	250	475	650	675	690	650+1d%
Gnomes	3	7	12	15	19	35	190	350	490	550	610	490+4d%
Halflings	3	5	9	12	16	20	50	70	85	95	110	85+1d10+1d20
Half-Elves**	3	7	10	13	17	20	62	72	81	100	125	81+2d%
Half-Orcs**	2	5	7	9	12	14	30	35	40	50	60	40+4d10
Dwarves***	7	13	20	27	33	40	125	150	175	200	225	175+14d20
Gapakayri	1 1/2	3	10	12	19	25	64	76	83	100	125	83+8d12
Stelibou	1	3	5	9	17	24	50	120	146	163	190	146+5d12
Kappa****	2	5	7	9	12	14	100	182	263	320	500	263+2d%+6d20+4d12

Spoiler: Footnotes for 2nd table

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*Everything that reaches venerable before 200 years old should have separate rows for High Magic/Low Magic/Modern like Humans do, but I’m too lazy to do that tight now; I have only created the High Magic Versions for other races...
**Half-Elves and Half-Orcs are included for completeness with core... I would not include them as races in a setting I designed, as I feel they should be far too rare to be considered races...
***I like the long infancy for dwarves - they grow slowly like a mountain... If you don't like the long infancy, I'd recommend 2, 6,14, 27, 33, etc.
****Kappa have Rite Publishing PF Racial Stats but look like this:

Note Both of these images are cropped from artwork by humon. They depict the same character. Kappa skin tones can be any shade of green, yellow, or blue; hair colors can be black or darker shades of green or blue...

Modifications for other tech/magic level settings:

Spoiler: Alternate progression for Modern Settings

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Infant	chose one A
Toddler	chose one A
Child	chose one A
Preteen	chose one A or B
Teen	choose one B
Grown (Legally Adult)	choose one B or C
Adult	Choose one C
Middle Age	choose one C and lose 1 A or Choose one D
Mature Adult	choose one C and lose 1 A or Choose one D
Senior	lose one A or B and gain a D; lose an extra A to gain a C
Elderly	lose one A or B and gain a D
Venerable	lose one A or B and gain a D

Spoiler: Alternate progression for Historical and Low Magic Settings

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Toddler	chose one A
Child	chose one A or B
Pre-Adolescent	chose one A or B
Adolescent	choose one B or C
Post Adolescent (Legally Adult for Most Purposes)	choose one B or C
Young Adult	Choose one C
Adult (Legally Adult for All Purposes)	choose one C
Middle Age	choose one C and lose 1 A or Choose one D
Mature Adult	choose one C and lose 1 A or Choose one D
Senior	lose one A or B and gain a D; lose an extra A to gain a C
Elderly	lose one A or B and gain a D

The Traits:

Spoiler: Class A Traits

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• Gain 1 Extra Bonus Language; Languages cost half as much
• -2 int, +2 Wis and Cha
• -2 cha, +2 Int and Wis
• gain a feat that provides a bonus to two skills*; skills always class skills
• -2 con, +2 Dex and Cha
• gain a feat that provides a bonus to a save**; bonus increases every 5th level
• *Acrobatic, Agile, Alertness, Animal Affinity, Athletic, Deceitful, Deft Hands, Diligent, Investigator, Magical Aptitude, Negotiator, Nimble Fingers, Persuasive, Self-Sufficient
• **Great Fortitude, Iron Will, Lightning Reflexes (limit one of these)

Spoiler: Class B Traits

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• base speed increases by 10 ft.
• make one skill a permanent class skill
• +2 to one ability score, -2 to another
• +2 to a skill

Spoiler: Class C Traits

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• +5 to saves against poison, -2 Wis
• +2 to one ability score, -4 to another
• +1 Intimidate, -2 Diplomacy and Bluff
• +1 Gather Info, -2 Intimidate and Sense Motive
• Gain lowlight vision (or increase its range by 10 ft.) -4 to spot in areas of bright light
• +1 Spot, -2 to Search
• +1 Spot, -2 to Listen
• +1 Search, -2 to Spot
• +2 Initiative, -2 AC
• +2 Concentration, -2 Listen and Spot
• +1 Sense Motive, -2 Intimidate and Diplomacy

Spoiler: Class D Traits

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• -4 Ability Score
• -6 one Ability Score, +2 another
• -2 to an ability score you have already taken a hit to from a D list trait
• Reduce HP by 5, gain one fewer HP for subsequent levels
• In combat, every time you attack an opponent that has concealment, roll your miss chance twice. If either or both results indicate that you miss, your attack fails.
• +2 bonus on saves against enchantment (compulsion) effects, -6 penalty on initiative checks
• Base speed is halved
• -4 Spot and Listen, +1 Knowledge checks
• -6 Intimidate, +2 Diplomacy
• -6 Listen and Spot, +2 Concentration

[Knitifine]

This seems extremely complicated, I think it's probably best to just ignore aging rules and have aging exist as a justification or character trait rather than making it a important leg in their mechanical makeup.

Also not that the reason people didn't live longer in the past wasn't because they aged faster, but because modern medical technology prevents people from dying to numerous illnesses. So having separate tracks for low-fantasy/historical seems a little silly.

[Ranged Ranger]

This seems extremely complicated, I think it's probably best to just ignore aging rules and have aging exist as a justification or character trait rather than making it a important leg in their mechanical makeup.

Regardless of what mechanics aging uses, unless your campaign has extreme compression of time or long jumps in time between sessions/stages of the campaign, aging by non-magical means will probably be rare considering each category is several years long. In practice, I assume that it would normally be a matter of choose an age/category, use the table(s) to determine how many of each kind of trait to have and then select the traits. Once it's set you shouldn't have to mess with it all that often, and theirs nothing stopping you from making all of your decisions in advance and recording it on the back of your character sheet if you want.

Also not that the reason people didn't live longer in the past wasn't because they aged faster, but because modern medical technology prevents people from dying to numerous illnesses. So having separate tracks for low-fantasy/historical seems a little silly.

While that is mostly true, also keep in mind that average life expectancy numbers are heavily skewed by higher historical infant mortality rates (usually defined more broadly than it sounds as under 5 y.o.). It wasn't uncommon to have an average life expectancy of 45, while the average life expectancy of those who survived to see their 6th birthday was 65 or 70.

Meanwhile modern medicine is also improving the quality of life and reducing long term affects of diseases that people survive. While we are not necessarily aging more slowly, we are accumulating negative after affects of diseases that were historically seen as part of aging at a reduced rate.

Also children are under less pressure to take on adult responsibilities, which means they are not maturing as quickly in certain respects not strictly connected to aging, but which could play a role in what traits develop when...

[aimlessPolymath]

This seems to add a whole lot of complexity and a whole new way to minmax your character, without much advantage as far as I can see.

Thoughts:
-You can grab some key prereq feats(skills + saves)easily- this can make silly builds easier to do, but both in good and bad ways. You'll want to know who you want to be early.
-Max out important stats easily, kill dump stats.
-Some ability to pick up skills that are otherwise inaccessible.
-A lot, lot more work for DMs who want this to affect NPCs; to counteract this, I suggest putting together some "standard packages" of characters of different backgrounds.
-I would honestly be a lot more comfortable with this if it came bundled with some kind of lifepath system for character generation. As it is, this just seems like an extra method for optimizing your character- you basically get to pick a bunch of advantages, and can optimize your stats to a silly degree.

I suspect I would be more comfortable with this with some alternate rules relating to player choice- like the difference between rolled stats & point-buy. I'm not suggesting a full lifepath system, but some ties to real life would be nice.


I'm just not sure what problem you're trying to solve here.

[Ranged Ranger]

This seems to add a whole lot of complexity and a whole new way to minmax your character, without much advantage as far as I can see.

Thoughts:
-You can grab some key prereq feats(skills + saves)easily- this can make silly builds easier to do, but both in good and bad ways. You'll want to know who you want to be early.
-Max out important stats easily, kill dump stats.

Thanks for this feed back.

-Some ability to pick up skills that are otherwise inaccessible.

And that's bad how?

-A lot, lot more work for DMs who want this to affect NPCs; to counteract this, I suggest putting together some "standard packages" of characters of different backgrounds.

I kind of figured most NPCs would have their stats picked with dice rolls or computer macros including RNGs... Standard packages aren't a bad idea... will keep in mind when I get a chance to revise this...
PCs and major NPCs are special and should get a little more customization...

-I would honestly be a lot more comfortable with this if it came bundled with some kind of lifepath system for character generation. As it is, this just seems like an extra method for optimizing your character- you basically get to pick a bunch of advantages, and can optimize your stats to a silly degree.

I suspect I would be more comfortable with this with some alternate rules relating to player choice- like the difference between rolled stats & point-buy. I'm not suggesting a full lifepath system, but some ties to real life would be nice.

I'm just not sure what problem you're trying to solve here.

I hadn't heard of lifepath systems before; just looked it up... thanks!



Based on this feedback, I'm thinking about having four options for selecting the traits: entirely based on dice roll; lifepath with dice; lifepath without dice; and fully custom... use either a point buy or xp cost to move from one method to the next... Will have to wait until after I get home from Thanksgiving though...

[aimlessPolymath]

Yeah, the ability to pick up skills outside your normal set is a plus. I was accumulating thoughts about the system and it cam up- but on balance, I'm not currently a fan.


Some thoughts on the elderly:
I actually feel like aging could be handled as some kind of fusion between the disease system and a hypothetical injury system that covers long-term damage and scarring- as you age, you take random ability score drain, and associated specific effects related to the lost stats (poor vision, difficulty eating, lessened mobility, etc.) While a divergence from existing systems, I feel like this better represents the way in which aging causes damage to the body.

The normal stat bonuses to mental abilities that older characters get in 3.5 feel like they could be approximated by the normal bonus to stats that you get from leveling! After all, those bonuses are supposed to cover increased life experience and perspective, but you know what else effectively represents life experience? Being a higher level!

On lifepath stuff:
I would personally go for "lifepath, with variable amount of dice" - different DMs may allow players varying amounts of control over their character's backstory/optimization, but I would say a lifepath system is probably one of the best ways to use your set of bonuses and penalties.

This also leaves a certain amount of space to leave undefined until later, or let players decide on specific things and leave others random; perhaps a player knows that their character was definitely a sailor, but not what happened before then?

You could even, in some games, leave part of your character undefined, until it suddenly comes up that oh, I spent three years learning poetry before quitting school to fight crime right before the Paladin Talent Show. It's a little silly, but it would work in more narrative games.

[Grog Logs]

While that is mostly true, also keep in mind that average life expectancy numbers are heavily skewed by higher historical infant mortality rates (usually defined more broadly than it sounds as under 5 y.o.). It wasn't uncommon to have an average life expectancy of 45, while the average life expectancy of those who survived to see their 6th birthday was 65 or 70.

Correct. For those interested in raw data in greater detail, I am re-posting a link that I made in another thread. It shows the average ADDITIONAL life expectancy at by age at different time periods.

Life Expectancy by Age, 1850–2011

[Ranged Ranger]

Correct. For those interested in raw data in greater detail, I am re-posting a link that I made in another thread. It shows the average ADDITIONAL life expectancy at by age at different time periods.

Life Expectancy by Age, 1850–2011

Thanks. This is actually more granular than any of the similar charts I've seen... (Although one of the other ones went all the way back into the mid-1700s...)

[Lazymancer]

Yes. As is, the system is needlessly complicated and doesn't have much merit. Reworking it into lifepath system (good examples: Beyond the Wall or Traveller) would a good thing.

While that is mostly true, also keep in mind that average life expectancy numbers are heavily skewed by higher historical infant mortality rates (usually defined more broadly than it sounds as under 5 y.o.). It wasn't uncommon to have an average life expectancy of 45, while the average life expectancy of those who survived to see their 6th birthday was 65 or 70.

While you are correct (average life expectancy can go down to 30s), you are confusing child mortality (under 5 y.o.) and infant mortality (under 1 y.o.). Also, it's not historical.

[jqavins]

I'll join the chorus singing "It's too complicated." And here are a few specifics:

• There are too many age brackets at both ends.
  
  • A student of early childhood development, or the parent of a former child, will tell you that there are many changes in a short time and the many categories here represent a simplification. But those changes by and large will have no effect on game play. For an RPG, as opposed to a real life simulation, infant and toddler might as well be the same, and likewise child and pre-adolescent, if you mean by that what I think you mean.
  • By pre-adolescent, you seem to mean pubescent. In modern western society, an adolescent is someone past puberty but before adulthood.
  • Alternatively, infant, toddler, and child could all be combined, and pubescent rolled into adolescent.
  • Speaking as 53 year old, and someone who's known a few old folks, I expect only one or two more noteworthy phases in my life: old, and (if I live long enough) very old (also called venerable).
  • What's the difference between post-adolescent and adult?
  • What do you mean by "mature adult" and "senior"? Mature truly means grown up, not childish, though recently it has become a media euphemism for old. Senior is a long standing euphemism for old. So two categories in between middle aged and elderly seem like something you made up.
  • I don't see any game benefit to more categories than Baby/child^* → Pubescent/adolescent^* → Young adult → Middle Age → Old → Venerable.
  
  
• As we gain experience, we can choose what things to practice and traits to develop, which are represented by skills and feats. But we do not get to choose what age will do to our bodies and brains. I can see how having a few different possibilities makes sense, but having the opportunity to pick and choose them does not make any sense to me.
• I don't know about other editions, but as I recall the AD&D DMG states explicitly that the stats you determine by dice (or other method) are for young adulthood, where most PCs begin. If your character is some other age, make adjustments forward or backward. You rarely have to do this at all, and very rarely more than one category. Even with the expanded range of possible effects, this same starting point would greatly reduce the ungainly complexity of this proposed system as described.

* Or Baby/child/pubescent → Adolescent → Young adult → Middle Age → Old → Venerable. Take your pick; it makes little difference.

[Dr_Dinosaur]

I'm going to voice support for refining rather than dumping the complexity. More granularity is a good thing imo (though players would definitely be less intimidated if it were part of a lifepath system)